Time Mage Madoka Magica
by GKinni
Summary: Madoka saw the destruction. She saw everyone die. "I want to be able to go back and save everyone!" And with this wish, the world changed.
1. Wish

**May 28**

Madoka Kaname had a perfectly normal routine. Waking up, going to school, spending time with her friends, doing her homework, going to sleep. It was the kind of idyllic lifestyle adults write multiple books about. At no point had Madoka imagined that she would get lost on the way home, be attacked by weird dog monsters and saved by two girls wearing beautiful costumes.

But there she was.

"You're lucky, you know. We usually don't patrol around here, but we decided to change things up a little today."

The girl who spoke had the most distinctive appearance of the two. She had blonde hair done in two drill shapes, a dress with long sleeves and a short skirt as well as boots and knee socks. She seemed more mature than her stated age of fifteen. She introduced herself as Tomoe Mami.

"But it's good that we were able to get here in time."

The other girl had braided black hair and wore glasses, her dress was only slightly different from a school uniform, and she wore a black pantyhose. Her most striking aspect were the gray "wings" she showed in the battle, while her partner seemed to simply create guns out of the air.

Also, she was a student that had transferred into Madoka's class only two days before, named Akemi Homura.

"You have a great potential, would you like to be a magical girl?"

And then a white cat-thing made this proposition to her. After everything she saw that day, the cat was Madoka's last straw. She promised to speak to them in the next day, before running home and collapsing in bed.

 **May 29**

"Good morning."

Apparently the cat-thing(named Kyubey) could talk in her mind and was invisible to most people. And was currently keeping an eye on Madoka due to the suggestion of the two girls.

"I can also set up so you can communicate with them via telepathy, as well.

And that. So, Madoka went back to her regular routine, with the addition of the invisible Kyubey giving an extra dose of whimsy to everything. It was slightly surreal, a big difference from the extremely surreal experience of the previous day.

"So, you want to know what being a magical girl is all about before making any decisions, right? This is a pretty mature way of doing things." Mami, who seemed to be the leader of the two, praised her.

That had indeed been what Madoka had suggested. Setting up a meeting with both magical girls had been easy with the help of Kyubey's telepathic network, and she just had to tell her friends Sayaka and Hitomi that she had things to do and they should not wait for her. It was true, after all.

Madoka's decision had been based on the fact that she had seen far too little of what the magical girls did, since their only interaction was them saving her from some weird dog monsters. And she doubted that was all there was to being a magical girl.

The two took her on patrol but they ended up not finding anything. Apparently, after she went back home, the two had searched around and found the "Witch" responsible for the monsters she had met yesterday, and killed her.

They were very apologetic about having wasted her time, but she told the two not to worry, she definitely wouldn't make a decision until she had seen everything firsthand.

 **June 1**

That was when they finally hit paydirt. The two magical girls had split, with Homura escorting Madoka around while Mami searched for herself. In the end, Homura managed to find the entrance of a labyrinth, and then she called Mami, who arrived quickly. The three of them entered into it.

Entering into the labyrinth was a particularly trippy experience. Madoka could see herself and the two magical girls, and they made a ridiculously sharp contrast with the environment. And that was because the environment looked like something out on an animated movie, and one of the more experimental ones even.

The two magical girls were skilled, and Mami was experienced, so between the two of them Madoka was kept safe even as more and more monsters that looked like they were crayon drawings fused with balloons and given life appeared and attacked. Mami summoned dozens of muskets to shoot at the enemies, while Homura increased the size of her wings and swept them around as both attack and defense.

Eventually, they fought the Witch, or rather, Homura fought the Witch while Mami gave long range support while also protecting Madoka. And speaking of the Witch, she was an even more bizarre thing than all of the bizarre things Madoka had seen until then. It was a monster composed of three clown heads connected together by construction style steel beams that formed the outline of a turtle shell.

The monster attacked by breathing molten metal that could turn into metal lions, but with Mami dealing with the lions from a distance, Homura only had to worry about dodging the breath and counter-attacking. It only took around a minute and a half for her to manage to take the enemy down.

After they were out, Mami asked her:

"So... What did you think?"

Madoka had a pained expression "I... I'm sorry... But all that felt too scary... Thinking about fighting like you... I can't..."

Both Mami and Homura were completely understanding of her decision, something that only made her feel worse. But the big thing was... She simply didn't have any wishes that she wanted enough to actually accept doing something so scary.

 **June 13**

The next two weeks passed almost normally. Madoka still saw Kyubey once in a while, and he said that if she changed her mind about making a wish, he would always be there.

However, things changed when Kyubey realized that Sayaka, one of Madoka's friends, actually also had the potential to become a magical girl.

The two discussed about it, and Madoka told her all about her experiences in the witch's labyrinth. And in the end, Sayaka's opinion about the whole deal was the same as Madoka's: She simply did not have anything she wanted so badly as to make a wish for it.

But still, days later, Sayaka reappeared as a magical girl to save Madoka from another witch. And when asked why she had made a wish, her only answer was:

"I found something worth wishing for."

And Madoka could only cheer her friend on, as she went to fight.

 **June 23**

Madoka could barely understand how things had gotten so bad. She had heard the news about an approaching storm, but only realized how powerful it was when her mom came home early, saying that they had to go to a shelter.

Even from inside it, Madoka could tell that the situation was deteriorating, with the sounds from the outside getting increasingly terrifying, and the adults who had information revealing dark expressions.

And then Kyubey appeared, saying that the culprit for all of that was a witch. A powerful witch that her friends were facing at that very moment. And they weren't winning.

Upon hearing that, Madoka couldn't help herself. She sneaked out of the shelter and set out to go towards her friends, without even thinking about what she wanted to do when she got there.

It wasn't difficult to know where to go, since she just had to follow the destruction to its epicenter, but actually going there was by far the hardest thing Madoka had ever done in her life.

The wind and rain of the storm were very strong, so much that Madoka had to struggle just to move forward without falling. And the path wasn't straightforward either, with tons of wreckage spread all around, forcing Madoka to watch her step constantly as she slipped and fell more than once while climbing over those precarious paths.

And yet, the wasn't the worst thing. The absolute worst part were the bodies. The first one Madoka saw was mostly buried in the remains of a house, with only an arm sticking out, as if trying to escape even to the last breath. That alone was enough to drive Madoka almost to her breaking point, but the further she walked towards the center, the more and worse things she saw.

Madoka got a front row seat to the true tragedy and horror of a disaster of such magnitude. She saw people's faces contorted in pain, saw mothers holding their children while trying vainly to protect them until the end, she saw blood and guts.

Madoka was shocked into numbness, unable to process despair at such a scale, and she kept walking more due to sheer inertia than any other reason. And that was probably a good thing, because as she got closer, the side effects of the battle started affecting her surroundings, resulting in several near misses that would have filled her with too much fear to move, were she not so numb.

Eventually, she reached the actual battlefield, and she saw the terrifying witch that had caused all of that. It was a building sized figure vaguely reminiscent of a jester, floating upside down and releasing a broken sound with only a vague resemblance to laughter.

Two figures were jumping around it, flashes of blue and red. Walking in their direction, Madoka almost stumbled upon yet another horrible scene: It was Mami, who was obviously dead, her body cut in half at the waist. And recoiling away from it, she saw Homura, dead on the ground, her clothes soaked with blood.

That broke through her numbness. Madoka's eyes teared, but she still did not cry. She looked back at the fight, and realized that the blue figure was her friend Sayaka. Moments after, the witch spun and hit Sayaka, shooting her at high speed in Madoka's direction.

The girl landed a few feet away from Madoka.

"Sayaka-chan!" She screamed, and ran to the side of her friend.

"Madoka-chan? What are you doing here?" Sayaka asked, struggling to try and sit up as well as looking around with unseeing eyes.

"I-I wanted to see if you were okay..." Was the only answer Madoka could give.

Sayaka smiled grimly, shaking her head "That's just like you." She then forced herself into a sitting position "You don't need to worry... The witch is slowly growing weaker... We can defeat her..." And with a grunt, she stretched back upwards "Be careful." She spoke before jumping back into the fight.

+0+

Sayaka had not been lying, and the two eventually managed to kill the powerful witch. Madoka ran towards them, now that the danger had passed, and found the two magical girls lying side by side, their bodies riddled with injuries.

"Are you two okay?" Madoka asked as she approached, even though she felt a sinking feeling in her heart that the answer was no.

"Ah. We won." Sayaka said "Just like I told you, Madoka." She spoke in a detached way.

"Your name is Madoka, huh?" the other girl seemed only slightly more aware "The answer is no. I'm too hurt to move anymore... not enough magic to heal... I don't think she's any different."

"My name is Sayaka." Said girl spoke, sounding annoyed "Sayaka Miki. Ah-" She seemed to suddenly think of something "I never caught your name. Thank you for coming to help, by the way."

"I'm Kyouko Sakura." The red-haired girl identified herself "And I just... Felt like it, I guess."

But Sayaka did not respond to that. She had finally closed her eyes and breathed for the last time.

Madoka turned away, tears falling from her eyes, and she spoke:

"Kyubey."

He appeared.

"Do you have a wish you want to make?" He deduced.

"Yes." Madoka said, filled with determination "I want to be able to go back and save everyone!"

A white light shined, and then the world changed.


	2. Magical Girl Powers

Loop 1

 **May 23**

Madoka opened her eyes and looked around, startled.

She was back on her bed, on her room, and for a single moment, Madoka thought that everything that happened had only been a dream, but she soon rejected the idea. Her feelings were too intense to have been product of a mere dream.

So, Madoka got up and immediately noticed something strange. She had a necklace that she didn't remember putting on, and it took only a few moments for the girl to realize that the jewel on the necklace was the same kind that she had seen Mami and the other girls wearing.

It was a "Soul Gem". The proof that she was now a Magical Girl. So that meant her wish must have worked, right?

Madoka really wanted to check it out, so she forewent her usual wake up routine in favor of running to the living room. Her mother was there watching the news, and Madoka took a look at them, knowing that the current date would be displayed just before each commercial.

And when it showed up, it was the 23rd of May, exactly one month before that terrible day. She had done it, Madoka had traveled in time.

Madoka returned to her room and did her best to try and act normally, even as she thought of what should be her course of action from then on.

Her main goal would be to help the others to defeat that colossal witch in order to prevent not only the death of her friends (and Kyouko was included in that) but also all that mass destruction and death caused by the monster. But since she was a magical girl, that meant she should also fight to protect people from witches in general.

Regardless, an important thing to do for both of those objectives was actually getting a hang of her magical girl powers, otherwise it wouldn't make a difference if she was there or not. With that in mind, Madoka headed to school.

+0+

"Hey, Madoka-chan, want to go to the mall together?" Her friend Sayaka asked her that after they were done with the school day.

It was a familiar request, but Madoka didn't respond to it in the usual manner.

"Sorry, Sayaka." Madoka said with her hands together and an awkward smile on her face "I need to improve my grades, so I'm going back home early today."

"Ah, okay." Sayaka blinked in surprise "Well, I don't know if I can help you. But if you need anything, you can call me."

"Okay. Thanks." Madoka said with a nod.

She didn't like lying to her friend, but Madoka still hadn't decided on the best way to explain what was going on. And perhaps there was also another reason... Perhaps she was trying to make up for not having helped the first time by trying to become stronger.

Madoka went back home and locked herself inside her bedroom before holding onto her soul gem and focusing.

She didn't exactly know how to transform, but somehow it seemed to be instinctive, because when she actually tried, Madoka was almost immediately swept over by a feeling of cold, but not an unpleasant type of cold. It felt a bit like drinking ice cream on a hot day, except that the feeling started on her heart and spread all over her body.

Then Madoka felt lighter and full of energy. Opening her eyes, she was able to see that the transformation had finished. She was now wearing a very fancy and very puffy dress, in a combination of pink, red, white and yellow, complete with a lot of frills, two ribbons, simple white gloves and socks, and fancy pink shoes. Her soul gem had become a necklace.

More interesting though, was the object that had materialized itself near her head. It was a pink hourglass, which did not seem to have any sand inside and was calmly floating through the air.

With a thought, Madoka made it move left, and then right. It seemed like she could control it to move however she wanted. But what was the use of this?

And then instinct struck again, and she knew the answer to that question. It felt like there was some kind of switch on her mind while she looked at the hourglass, and she knew with absolute certainty that if she flipped that switch, Madoka would wake up back a few hours, the same time she woke up after coming back in time.

It didn't feel like she could make it do anything else. She would always return to that specific point in time and space in case the hourglass was activated.

"So... I have time powers. But I don't think that's my weapon..." She wondered aloud.

Extending her hand, she willed the weapon to appear, and it did without much delay. The weapon was a white scepter with a red jewel on top. Madoka swung it a few times for practice, and became surprised at how fast she could get it to move. It wasn't a property of the scepter itself, but simply product of her enhanced strength and physical control in magical girl form.

She still had to test just how much power she could put into the swing (could she actually compete with the power of Mami's guns and Sayaka's swords?) but she was definitely unable to test such a thing while inside her own house.

With a thought, she turned back to normal and went downstairs.

"Dad, I'm going out for a bit. I'll be back soon." She told her father.

"Okay, Madoka. Be careful out there." Was his response.

"Understood. Bye-bye!" She left the house.

+0+

Madoka went to a part of the city she had rarely visited before: The industrial zone. It was a pretty empty place, perfect for what she wanted to do. Madoka had heard from Mami that, unless they entered a witch's barrier, it was very difficult for ordinary humans to see magical girls, but she still wanted to be careful.

She went straight to the border of the area, which was also on the limits of the city. Madoka had to take a bus to get close enough, but soon she was beyond the city limits and behind a hill.

Transforming herself again, Madoka raised her scepter to the air and focused her whole strength before bringing it back down.

The sound felt like an explosion, and Madoka felt very relieved to have gone so far before doing that test. She had created a crater on the ground. It wasn't a particularly large crater, but it was still significant.

Taking a deep breath, she tried to think of any other uses for the scepter, since it didn't seem to be just a blunt instrument. Again, her instincts brought forth an answer. It felt like there was two "spells" she could do, simply by thinking about it. One of them appeared to be for herself, while the other was for enemies.

With a wave of her hand, Madoka used the first. She didn't feel any different, but she had an idea of what had happened. Grabbing a rock from the ground, she threw it up lightly. She observed the rock fall, and saw that it was going very slowly, like it was a feather.

Or rather, she was going very fast. Madoka decided to call that spell "Haste".

Thinking about the other spell, Madoka grabbed another rock and threw it up. She tried to call upon the other spell, but it didn't work. Just as she suspected, it seemed like she could only use one of the spells at a time.

Canceling her haste, Madoka repeated her previous action, but this time the spell worked. The rock fell down slowly again. She christened that second spell "Slow".

With a bit more experimentation, Madoka figured out a few more facts about her spells. First was the fact that she wasn't actually targeting objects, but areas. She could use her slow or haste against multiple targets by simply defining a large enough area.

There were several limitations to that. The farther away from her, and the larger the area, the more delay there would be for the spell. Also, while she could instinctively move the area of her haste to correspond with the movements of her body, the same could not be said of any allies or enemies she used her powers on, and she would need to track them actively.

Finally, there was the matter of impact. By accelerating herself, she could make her swings hit even harder, and conversely, slowing things down would reduce their strength of impact.

Madoka was thinking of other things to test when she suddenly felt a nasty sensation, as if a cold hand had touched her temple. It didn't take long for her to realize that she was sensing a witch nearby.

Madoka shuddered, but then shook her head and mustered up her will. She was a magical girl now. She had a duty to fight witches, and she wouldn't be able to help anyone if she was afraid of that.

Madoka ran back into the city, trusting that no one would be able to see her, and followed the nasty feeling to its source: An alley next to a factory.

Running into it, Madoka found herself inside the witch's barrier.

+0+

The place looked like a bizarro version of a beach. There was no ground, only an endless blue abyss with islands of sand and water all around up and down left and right. Parasols and other similar objects littered the sand, while strange creatures that only somewhat resembled fishes and crabs scuttled around the water.

High above, there was something that could only be the witch. A sun shaped balloon without a basket, spewing fire from its underside.

Madoka froze for a moment at the prospect of having to jump from platform to platform above that abyss, but then she remembered running to the barrier so fast it was almost like she was a car. Her physical abilities were greatly increased, so she took the chance and leaped.

Madoka overshot her target slightly, but made a snap decision to command her hourglass to push her body to the right direction, managing to land without issues. Soon after, the familiars attacked.

The fish were leaping and spinning like clockwork, their tails used like sharp blades. The crabs fell from the air in an endless bombardment, their claws extended like spears. Madoka hasted herself and swung her staff from one side to another, sending the enemies flying. Her quicker reactions meant she had more than enough time to defend against all attacks.

Finding a chance, Madoka leapt to a higher island, and speedily kept moving upwards, giving the familiars no chance to target her with more than one or two at once. She reached the witch and tried to hit her with a fast swing, which was dodged. The witch counter-attacked with a bunch of fireballs, which Madoka also blocked with swings.

And then she felt a sharp pain on her back. She had forgotten about the familiars, and a crab had taken advantage of that. The pain addled her for long enough that a fish managed to leap at her and cut through her soul gem.

Madoka's eyes darkened and she fell to the ground, lifeless.

The hourglass, as if it had a will of its own, turned once.

Loop 2

 **May 23**

Madoka opened her eyes and looked around, startled.

She grabbed her chest, still feeling phantom pain. She looked around, trying to calm herself down and get her thoughts in order.

She had died. And now she was back at the start again.


	3. Will to Move Forward

Madoka sat up, hugged herself and trembled. She had already known that being a magical girl was dangerous, but this time she felt on her skin what that meant.

Taking a few deep breaths, Madoka grasped her Soul Gem and forced herself to think back to that fight. Little by little, she started getting a handle on what had happened.

'First, something attacked me from behind.' Madoka thought back to the sudden sharp pain she had experienced 'And then a fish cut through my... Soul Gem...'

After that Madoka had no memory of anything. Apparently, destroying her Soul Gem had killed her instantly.

'So, I have to protect my Soul Gem better.' She thought 'No, not just that, I have to protect myself better too.'

The reason for her loss was losing track of what the familiars were doing, which allowed one of them to attack her from behind.

'The next time I fight that thing, I have to pay more attention.' Madoka decided.

'Next time...' The thought felt weird in her head 'Do I really need to fight that witch again?'

A moment passed, and then another one. Madoka realized why she had asked herself that. She was afraid.

Gripping one arm with enough strength to hurt, she forced herself to stop even considering that.

'If I'm too afraid to even fight an ordinary witch, then how can I hope to save everyone?' She scolded herself 'They fought those kinds of witches all the time, to protect people... So how can I consider myself one of them if I back down out of fear?!'

It was decided. She would definitely fight against that witch again, and she would win. That would be the only way to prove to herself that she could really do something, that she could really help them. Mami, Homura, Sayaka, Kyouko... She owed it to them to not back down on the very first obstacle.

Otherwise, what good was her wish even for, anyway?

+0+

After that, Madoka's day proceeded very similarly to the previous time. Brushing her teeth, washing her face, eating her breakfast and going to school. She tried to appear attentive to the teacher's lecture, even though it was the exact same thing she had heard on the previous day, but that was pretty much the only actual difference.

Until it came time to talk with Sayaka, that is. This time, when she told the lie about needing to study, Sayaka's reaction was different.

She looked at Madoka, raised and lowered her hand a few times, and finally spoke carefully:

"Madoka... Is everything okay with you?" She asked.

That left Madoka completely flatfooted, she stammered for a few seconds before managing to answer "W-Why do you ask?"

"Because... There seems to be a lot of things on your mind." Sayaka spoke with a clear and calm voice "You know I can help if you have any problems, right?"

Hearing that, Madoka understood. Sayaka was her best friend, and she was able to tell that something had changed with her. In that case...

"There's just... Something I have to do." Madoka spoke vaguely "I'll explain it to you later, but I need to do it."

"Ahh... Okay, then." Sayaka said with uncertainty "Just be careful, okay?"

"Okay." Madoka said "I will."

+0+

After that, Madoka repeated what she had done on the previous day, going back home, and then going to the industrial zone after talking to her dad.

Madoka transformed again, and then started practicing with her magic once more, just to make sure everything was okay.

After a little more than a minute of this, Madoka grit her teeth. She was stalling. There was no need to wait for the signal, since she already knew where the labyrinth entrance was. It was only that... now that she was this close, thinking about going to fight again caused shivers to run down her body.

And yet... And yet she had to do it. Madoka forced herself to move, running full-tilt towards the place she remembered to be the right one.

This time, since she was focusing, Madoka began feeling the nasty sensation when she was just a few meters away from the wall that was the entrance. Reaching that point, she slowed down and took a deep breath, but refused to let her legs stop moving as she walked into the witch's barrier once more.

+0+

It was just the same as before. The endless sky, the islands of sand and water, the familiars, the witch...

Closing her eyes, Madoka Hasted herself, jumping through the air in the direction of the Witch.

The familiars jumped down towards her as a living bombardment, causing Madoka to recoil slightly in the middle of her jump. However, thanks to her Haste spell, Madoka had enough time to shake her head and glare at the enemies, refusing to let fear beat her.

Landing on the sand, she stopped to brace herself for the attacks. At that point, she realized once again the same thing she had on the previous fight.

'Slow.' Was her thought upon seeing the enemies diving at her. She swiped her scepter from side to side, stepping once every swing to take a step to a better position. The first wave of familiars was broken through, and Madoka jumped again after canceling her Haste.

She was intercepted in the air by a few familiars, but her confidence had been renewed, so any enemy that got even close ended up being batted away by her scepter.

Once again, Madoka reached the witch, and this time she attacked full on, using another Haste and straight up ramming into the enemy instead of trying to swing as she passed.

The attack felt like hitting a sandbag, but the Witch was thrown back a few feet. Madoka was now in free fall, but she twisted to look around, seeing the familiars approaching. She canceled her Haste once more.

She wasn't going to commit the same mistake as before. Madoka swung again and again at whatever got too close, before her free fall brought her to a water island which she sunk into slightly before managing to step back out, standing on the surface (she wasn't sure if that was due to magical girl skills or witch weirdness).

Jumping up again, Madoka climbed back up to the island nearest to the witch and leapt at her in another Haste assisted tackle, but this time the witch responded by bursting into flame. Madoka couldn't change her trajectory, so she braced herself for the pain and swung at the witch with full power.

It really did hurt. It hurt a lot. It was like the feeling of touching hot iron, except spread over her entire body. But Madoka discovered that she could somehow bear the pain (magical girl powers?), and there was an upside to the situation.

It was the fact that she had apparently surprised the witch by still going through with her attack, as this time the hit felt much more real, and seemed like it had actually done some damage to the interior of the enemy. Madoka hadn't even been bounced back by it, so she leapt backwards to escape from the fire, and once again turned to watch out for the familiars.

Landing on another water island and canceling her Haste, Madoka repeated her previous defense, but after turning back to look at the witch, she saw that her enemy had apparently gotten enraged due to the previous attack, and responded by unleashing a veritable hail of fireballs upon her position.

There were quite a lot of them, and they were fast, so Madoka Hasted herself again to gain enough speed to protect herself, batting away the fireballs one by one. But that was when something unexpected happened.

The water disappeared, causing Madoka to plunge into free fall. The fireballs had caused the island to evaporate.

Madoka fell extremely fast due to the haste, so she had already fallen pretty far by the time she managed to cancel it, and it was far enough that another gathering of familiars was already pouncing on her.

Madoka was forced to defend herself while in free fall, swinging around to block attacks from every direction. That lasted a whole three seconds before she landed on a sand island even further down. And looking up she saw that a "gathering of familiars" wasn't an appropriate description. There were an insane number of familiars converging on her direction, swarming at such numbers they literally blocked her view upwards.

That was too many. Far too many for her to defend against like before. Madoka's mind blanked for a moment before she made a decision and Hasted herself again.

'I'll break through them!' She declared in her mind and jumped with full strength, swinging her scepter in front as if to split open the tide of enemies.

The impact sounded like a crumbling building, as the mass of familiars was hit, causing those in the front to hit the ones behind in a massive chain reaction was Madoka's momentum caused her to break through the wave.

Only to find the Witch just behind it, already shooting a mass of fireballs.

Her momentum now turned against her, Madoka flew right into them, swinging back her scepter to try and block the fireballs. She actually managed a lot, but there were simply too many and too close, and one of them slipped through her defense and hit her left shoulder full-on.

That pain was much worse than the previous burning. It felt like her shoulder was being pierced by a hundred hot needles that broke apart and scattered inside her flesh. Madoka couldn't help but let out a cry.

She started falling back down. She saw a familiar leaping from the corner of her eye. She swung at it weakly with her right arm and blocked it. Even that movement caused waves of pain on her shoulder. She was still falling. She saw a deep scar on the place she had struck the witch before.

'If I hit her again...' Madoka thought, but at that moment, the Witch formed a few more fireballs.

'No...' Madoka thought 'I can't do anything... I'm going to lose again...'

But at that moment, she remembered Sayaka's state after the battle with that massive witch. She remembered how Sayaka had kept fighting so long to reach that state. So why was she allowing herself to give up? How was she supposed to save everyone like that?

No. She refused. Madoka wasn't going to surrender.

And with that thought, Madoka suddenly had an idea. She remembered the floating hourglass that had been following her quietly the whole time. She made it move below her. She stepped on it. She jumped at the witch again.

The fireballs shot at her, but instead of trying to swing her scepter to bat them aside, Madoka made a different decision. Canceling her Haste, she applied Slow to the entire area the fireballs were at.

She was still moving forward right at them, but the sudden slow down of both her and then gave Madoka an extra second and a half of leeway, which she used to bring the hourglass up and grab onto it to avoid the fireballs.

A fish leapt at her out of nowhere. She was holding both the hourglass and the scepter with her right arm, so she could not block as usual.

So, Madoka forced her left arm to move and shoved it at the fish's blade. There was a sharp pain and an impact as blade struck bone, but the fish was deflected. Madoka twisted herself to put a foot on top of the hourglass. She canceled the Slow. She left go with her arm and kicked off with her feet,. She Hasted herself again.

Ignoring everything else, Madoka flew at the witch. At the last moment, she stabbed forward with her scepter, acting almost like a jouster. She aimed at the wound she had given the witch before.

Madoka pierced right through, gouging a hole on the enemy.

There was a moment of silence before the witch screeched with a sound that felt like an explosion.

"GWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

Madoka turned back while still in flight, canceling her Haste. She saw the witch flying around convulsively and slowly breaking apart, and then it finally exploded, leaving behind a grief seed. Madoka landed on another island and jumped back to retrieve the seed, just before the world seemed to fold onto itself and she suddenly found herself standing on the same alleyway as before.

"I... won..." Madoka spoke as if she was trying to convince herself.

She leaned against the wall and breathed heavily before looking at her left arm. It was mangled by a huge gash and the shoulder part was burned nearly to the bone. It was astoundingly painful, and she could not return home like that.

Madoka remembered Kyouko talking about using magic to heal, so she held onto her soul gem and tried to will her arm to recover. It took a bit of time for anything to happen, but once it started, the healing occurred at a visible pace.

It was a strange sensation, but that was drastically better than the pain she had been feeling before, so Madoka kept going until her arm was back to normal. Then she took out the grief seed and placed it atop her soul gem, recharging it.

Finally, Madoka shed her transformed appearance, returning to being a normal girl.

At that time, she finally felt like she was a real Magical Girl.


End file.
